


12 P.M Is a Wonderful Time to Fantasize About Leaving the World Behind and Becoming a Cowboy

by moodyme



Series: Hours [12]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Anxiety, Friendship, Gen, Pre-Canon, adam isn't a geek, because yolo, he doesnt know anything about lotr, i wanted to tag it anyway, magic bois get anxiety too, thats not important to the story but, use of the word Yeehaw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-17
Updated: 2019-05-17
Packaged: 2020-03-06 11:01:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18849748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moodyme/pseuds/moodyme
Summary: Gansey has anxiety, wishes to become a cowboy.





	12 P.M Is a Wonderful Time to Fantasize About Leaving the World Behind and Becoming a Cowboy

**Author's Note:**

> For the anon on tumblr that requested 12 p.m, and Gansey and Adam and panic/anxiety  
> I hope you like it anon!!!  
> Pre-canon Y'all!!!

 Gansey was looking from his lunch to his watch and back again. Adam glanced at his own watch, read it was 12 p.m, and looked back at Gansey to watch as he looked back and forth between his food and watch. Adam wondered if he was waiting for Ronan to show up and bang his lunch down on their table. To Adam, that seemed like a ridiculous thing to wait for. Ronan was like the old guy in the Lord of the Rings, he always arrived when he wished. As he chewed his food, he continued to watch Gansey. He had switched up the watch-food routine by adding sudden, staccato, taps against the table with his finger tips. His face would go from looking pinched to forcefully calm, as though Gansey kept reminding himself to appear calm. Adam hadn't know Gansey for long, a few months, but he had noticed this pattern before. Gansey was feeling anxious and worrying over something. 

 'Milo's quiz?' Adam found himself saying. It was a guess, he knew Milo was giving a quiz later in the day and Adam wondered if that was what he was so worried about. Adam wasn't, but that was because Milo was predictable in his quizzes. If Gansey hadn't noticed his pattern, Adam would share it with him if it meant he wouldn't worry so much.

 'Sorry, what?' Gander asked, and he looked even more nervous. 

 Adam realized he had probably though Adam had been speaking this whole time and that he only just noticed. He was probably mentally berating himself about not being a good listener.

 'You're nervous, worried about something,' Adam explained, made a hand motion to bring Gansey's attention to his untouched pasta. 'I thought maybe you were worried about the quiz in English.'

 'No,' Gansey said, began to waved his hand dismissively only to stop himself mid-wave, frowned and continued, 'I- should I be?'

 'Probably not,' Adam said, ready to tell Gansey the tricks to study and pass all Milo's quizzes. 'Is there something else bothering you?'

 'I don't know... I feel like,' Gansey hesitated, opened his mouth and shut it twice, as though he were on the precipice of saying something before he realized it wasn't quite right. 'I feel that, perhaps, there is something I should be worried about, but I don't know what.'

 'You don't know what you're worried about?' Adam asked, surprised. Adam always had something to worry about, usually many somethings. But he always knew precisely what they were; his uniform, the weather, if his dad had had too much or too little to drink, if he had answered that math problem correctly, where he was going to get the money for the next Aglionby payment. The list went on and on, but that worry drove him. It made him puzzle out the where and how and when and why of his life. Sometimes, worry gave him strength. Strength to work for the day he would't have to worry.

 'Do you ever wish you could just drop everything and just... go away somewhere peaceful?' Gansey sighed, looking at Adam as though he held all the answers to the universe.

 'Constantly.' Adam didn't say, or 'Duh, have you met me?' or any of the other things that amounted to the same thing. Instead, he met Gansey's eyes from across the table (because he knew Gansey had a  _thing_ about eye contact) and instead asked the question he knew Gansey hoped he would ask (because it pleased Adam to please Gansey, as though to say, 'Look at me, look at the dust I've come from, but I can still give someone like Richard Gansey what it is they want').

 'Where would you go?' He asked instead.

 'Montana,' Gansey sighed, placed his thumb to his upper lip. He was still nervous, worried, but 'thumb-to-lip' was lower on the 'outward signs Gansey is worried' scale than 'not-eating-looking-at-his-watch-obsessively'.

 'Montana,' Adam repeated, hoping he didn't sound as incredulous as he felt.

 'Or Wyoming,' Gansey said, sitting a little straighter, 'Somewhere with wide, open spaces.'

 'What would you do with all that space?' Adam asked, honestly curious.

 Gansey spent several long moments considering Adam. Not his question, just him. Adam recognized this, too. It was Gansey, about to share something deeply personal, as he was wondering if you were worthy to hear his deepest parts of his being. Adam hoped, with a desperateness that surprised him, that he was. There was a twinge of guilt at the memory of several months ago, when he hated this boy. Not because of who he was, he hadn't know him then, but only because he existed in a life that Adam didn't. He might still hate the general population of Aglionby, but he didn't think he would ever quite be able to ever hate Gansey again.

 'I would get a horse,' Gansey began, 'and become a cowboy.'

 'Stetson hat and everything?' Adam asked. He was relieved to notice Gansey visibly relax. He began eating, which was even more relieving. 

 'Stetson hat and everything,' Gansey said after swallowing a bite of his lunch, 'cows, too.'

 'What would you do, with the horse and the stetson hat and the cows?' Adam asked, slid Gansey's milk closer to him in an attempt to encourage him to drink it. Pleased when that silent suggestion worked.

 'I would just roam, sleep under the stars,' Gansey said, his voice close to wistful, 'Ronan grew up on a farm, did you know that? He assures me that cows are quiet, docile creatures. I think they would make good companions for long nights in the open country. Quiet is a good thing.'

Adam heard a confidence in Gansey's voice that signaled he was no longer worried or nervous. That his anxiety had eased, if only briefly. There was a sense of pride in that, that Adam had been able to help Gansey, to help calm him when he needed him to.

 'Yeehaw,' Adam grinned.

 'Yeehaw, indeed.' Gansey answered.

**Author's Note:**

> “A wizard is never late, nor is he early, he arrives precisely when he means to.” ― Gandalf  
> ^^^ that's the quote Adam is referring to btw 😉  
> Also... there is a super vague ref to the Dixie Chicks song "Wide Open Spaces" in here... sorry!  
> This is heavily based on my own experiences with anxiety, and how I often don't know why it's actually happening and just wanting to run away from everything so if this sucks... I am so sorry...  
> Finally! I hope you notice Gansey wanting 'something' quiet, a nod to how Blue 'makes him quiet'... I love Bluesey so much, okay?


End file.
